


ribcages, and other things that need help to heal

by chockfullofsecrets



Category: Mission: Impossible (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Tickling, everything is fine except Ethan's ribcage, literally over a thousand words of fluff with the barest semblance of plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2019-06-24 05:19:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15623424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chockfullofsecrets/pseuds/chockfullofsecrets
Summary: “Did I ever tell you that Ethan is ticklish?”Luther blinked. Julia, sitting across from him as she types up Ethan’s worryingly long medical report, blinked innocently back at him.In which a plot is hatched regarding the mighty Ethan Hunt and a very particular weakness.Edit: now containing revenge and, somehow, a Fallout coda. Go figure.





	1. Chapter 1

“Did I ever tell you that Ethan is ticklish?”

Luther blinked. Julia, sitting across from him in her sensible khaki as she typed up Ethan’s worryingly long medical report, blinked innocently back at him. 

“If you had, I’d have been holding it over his head for years now.”

Julia grinned. “You can start today, then.” 

Back when they’d first started spending time together – when she’d been younger and scared and determined all at once, learning how to be a ghost for Ethan’s sake – Julia had taken up the habit of dropping bits of information about Ethan. His favorite foods, the drink he always ordered at the bar by their house. Like she was pouring out everything she knew about him from herself, drip by drip, preparing to remain forever silent on the subject of Ethan Hunt.

This particular tidbit, however, had eluded him. “Why tell me now?”

Her expression faded into a pensive smile. “When you all came running into camp, and I saw him … he has worry lines, right here.” She tapped her forehead. “Those are new.”

“We all do. It’s been a rough few years.”

“And it’s obvious that he hasn’t been sleeping well.” She looked down at her tablet, typed in something else. “I’m not worried about him, I know it won’t do any good and he can take care of himself. I just think he could stand to do a little less of… whatever his face has been doing, while he’s out there protecting us all.”

They both chuckled. Julia has worry lines too, furrowed between her eyebrows, but the way her eyes scrunched up told Luther that she’d been doing a lot more smiling than Ethan had, too. 

“Are you sure this isn’t step one in an elaborate plan to get me punched in the face?”

“No, no!” she laughed. “He likes it – or at least he used to.”

“Is that so. Because that’s exactly what someone who wanted to destroy my beautiful face would say.”

“He does!” she insisted, leaning in closer. “He doesn’t even try to get away. It’s sweet.”

Luther snorted; he knew from experience that Ethan being ‘sweet’ was either a follow-up or a precursor to Ethan being incredibly annoying and trying to avoid the consequences of his actions. Case in point, the way the man was giving doe eyes to everyone passing his rest bed and asking them to help him outside for some fresh air. He’d even succeeded twice, each time earning himself a lecture from Ilsa, Benji, and anyone else in earshot. And besides that, Ethan was the paramount of grace and dignity, when he wasn’t doing some ridiculous stunt. There was no way that he would appreciate being treated like a child.

But he also knew that Ethan only slept in fits nowadays, noticed his constant urge to reassure his friends that he would protect them. Seeing Julia alive and well and happy might have helped, but he’d do a lot worse to give Ethan some peace of mind, some of that happiness he wanted for everyone else. 

And maybe, just maybe, he was looking forward just a little bit to seeing the high and mighty Ethan Hunt beg for mercy. “All right, all right, I’m hooked. You want in on this, or –“

Julia leveled him with an unimpressed look. “He has four bruised ribs, Luther.”

“Right. I knew that.”

She turned her tablet off, drummed her fingers lightly against the table as she searched for words. “Just wait until his ribs are healed up, all right? God knows he should be spending another week in a hospital bed, not getting shipped halfway around the world.” 

He squeezed her hand. “Don’t worry about him too much, okay? Now that he knows you’re happy, maybe he’ll start getting over that massive guilt complex of his. And he’s got me and Benji and Ilsa looking out for him, and more people with various levels of espionage skill besides.”

Her lips trembled. “I already told you I’m not worried about him.”

“Oh, we all try to tell ourselves that. But seeing that stupid smirk he gets after doing something that would kill any sane human being, how could you not be?”

They both laughed at that. 

“I’m proud of him. Of all of you,” she said, squeezing back and smiling a little ruefully. “And Benji’s teaching me how to vet anonymous donors before you all leave, so hopefully the next time I see you it’ll be under better circumstances.”

“It had better be,” he grinned. “Now, only one of us has an itinerary that’s not classified to hell and back – so tell me, where are you and Patrick headed next?”

\---

Ethan was always a little quieter between the end of a mission and his debrief – something about needing time to get everything straight in his head and keep it there, he always said, which made sense considering that sometimes it seemed like he made decisions based on what was most likely to give his nearest teammate a heart attack – but after a straight week shut up in an American safehouse while IMF waited for someone with a high enough security clearance to take their statements, it was starting to wear on Luther a little. It was wearing on Ilsa and Benji too, he could tell, especially as Ethan kept looking at them like he was about to burst into apologies for every crime Solomon Lane had ever committed. The worry lines Julia had mentioned to him were out in full force.

After another round of their daily card game (high stakes, they were gambling dessert rations for the foreseeable future) came and went without Ethan’s presence, Luther decided that it was time to act on Julia’s intel. He found Ethan lounging on one of the beds, hands tucked neatly behind his head as he stared at the ceiling.

An ambush would be no good, not with someone like Ethan who’d been betrayed over and over again. Besides, he had the feeling that even a direct approach would catch the other man by surprise. 

Noting with some amusement that the recumbent man was short enough to leave a full foot of space at the end of the bed, he sat himself down by Ethan’s feet. “Hey, Ethan,” he said, shaking the man’s ankle lightly, “you missed out on losing all your dessert rations to Ilsa. She’s got one hell of a poker face.”

Ethan inclined his head slightly, regarding Luther with a suddenly sharpened gaze. “Still trying to figure out how the plutonium was getting passed around,” he said, mildly apologetic. Luther almost felt bad about starting to scratch at the bottom of the foot he was holding captive.

Ethan startled halfway into a sitting position, wheezing out a sound a little like he’d just been punched in the throat, then thumped back onto the bed with a decidedly undignified squirm. “Hey!”

“Ticklish?” Luther said, pleasant as he could, pausing long enough for Ethan to prop himself up on his elbows. 

“Who said anything about-” His eyes narrowed. “Julia?”

“Julia,” he confirmed, and continued his assault on the arch of Ethan’s foot. “Now, just say the word if you want me to stop.”

Ethan made a disgruntled noise, but said nothing; instead, he looked like he was trying to stare him down and failing entirely as his face crumpled into a grin. Luther took that as a sign to keep tickling. “For a guy who spends so much time running around and climbing things, you’ve got some pretty sensitive feet, brother. You getting regular pedicures or something?”

“Shut up,” Ethan growled, then trailed off into a fit of snickering as Luther discovered a sensitive spot just above his knee. 

His laughter and struggling gained in intensity as Luther found a couple good spots and thoroughly exploited them, and it wasn’t long before Ilsa and Benji appeared in the doorframe to find Ethan flat on his back, one hand pressed over his face and the other fisted in the sheets. Luther gave Ethan a chance to catch his breath, relieved to see that he looked more amused than anything when he turned his head to regard the rest of his team. “Oh great, more of you.”

“Aw,” Ilsa cooed, thoroughly ignoring Ethan’s dramatic grimace. “May we join you?”

She sat carefully on Ethan’s stomach, curling her legs up beneath her and grinning down at him. Her smile only grew when he tilted his head, considering, reached up to wrap a hand around her ribcage, and pushed her off with a mixture of tickling and a gentle shove. “Watch the ribs, remember?” 

“Oh, I’ll watch them,” Ilsa teased, delivering a single poke to said ribs. 

He abruptly slid his hand back over his face, and they all pretended that they hadn’t just heard him squeak.

Benji, headphones around his neck, looked a little more cautious. “I feel like, somehow, this is going to end in disaster.”

Ethan shifted his fingers enough to reveal one sparkling eye. “I’m not going to bite, Benji.”

Benji gaped. “Was that an option!”

“Shut up and pull up some real estate,” Luther chided, launching another attack on Ethan’s knees that left the spy laughing breathlessly. 

“Easy for you to say, you’re not on the side with his arms-“

Despite his grumbling, Benji perched on the bed opposite Ilsa. She started prodding at Ethan’s ribs again, and Benji poked gently if awkwardly at his stomach, and Ethan burst out into a fresh peal of laughter, pounding his hand against the mattress. His free leg was kicking around too, digging into the sheets, but Luther didn’t have the heart to pin him down. 

“Do you have a worst spot?” Ilsa suggested casually, taking a moment to dance a finger lightly over his neck. Shoulders climbing up to cradle his chin, Ethan shook his head frantically. 

“Cahahan’t … think,” he gasped out, but he’d made no move to get away from the three of them, even laughing hard and loud as he was, and unrestrained laughter was a good look on him. They all shared a satisfied look over his head, but unanimously gave him a few moments to catch his breath, mindful of his recently healed ribs.

“Well, there’s one spot we haven’t tried,” Benji said cheerfully after Ethan’s breathing settled, and then, “Ethan, if you crush my hands with your giant biceps I’m going to be very disappointed in you.”

Ethan cocked his head to the side, challenging, and Ilsa and Luther were already snickering at that, but then Benji darted his hands into the hollows under Ethan’s arms and he collapsed into a round of hysterics that had all of them laughing along until he finally slapped frantically at Benji’s arm and called for mercy. 

He moved to sit up and thought better of it, flopping back down and rubbing at the front of his ribcage. “Are you all right?” Ilsa asked, leaning in close. Her hair brushed against his arm as she wiped a tear from the corner of his eye, prompting Benji to mutter a quick ‘gross’ under his breath. 

He huffed, lips still quirked up in a smile. “Yeah.”

When he finally sat up he looked… happier. A little less tense, certainly, and when Benji and Ilsa both moved to ruffle his already-mussed hair he shoved them both in the shoulder with a light chuckle. 

Luther flicked his ankle. “Julia was right, it was cute.”

Ethan laughed. “We’ll see how cute it is when I decide to get my revenge.”

“I told you, didn’t I? Disaster!” Benji said, flinging his arms out. 

“If you want to turn this into a disaster for you specifically,” Ethan teased, grabbing his sleeve and starting to reel him in, “I can take care of that for you.”

“Nonono,” Benji yelped, pulling half his arm out of his sleeve as he tried to get away. They all burst out laughing. “I hate you all,” Benji grumbled, fixing his shirt, but he was half-laughing himself.

“I think we’ve earned another round of cards,” Ilsa said, chin resting on Ethan’s shoulder, and the room dissolved into an argument of how many bars of chocolate Ilsa actually deserved to keep from her previous winnings and whether Ethan, having escaped her clutches, should share with the rest of them. The thoughts of debriefs and dangers and guilt left for another day – for once, they could be just a happy team.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Due to public demand (read: one particularly kind and ambitious commenter) and my need to procrastinate, we now have a chapter where Ethan gets his revenge. Thank you for all your lovely comments!

He hadn’t been joking about getting his revenge, if only because it seemed like the rest of his team could use the same few rounds of hysterics that they’d put him through. It wouldn’t take that much effort, even – not that any of them would be able to escape him even under normal circumstances, but for the time being they were all trapped in a safe house together. 

Easy targets, for once. This was going to be _fun_.

He decided to start with Benji, arguably his easiest victim – and the one who probably wouldn’t be able to stand the anticipation of waiting for Ethan to get around to him. Benji was on his laptop with headphones on, eyes narrowed in concentration as he cocked a simulated rifle and fought off the… something… on his screen. Paying no attention to his surroundings – perfect. 

Ethan nudged him in the shoulder as he closed in, leaning his forearms on the back of Benji’s chair. Benji reached up and brusquely pushed one headphone cushion away from his ear. “Five minutes? Round’s almost done.”

“Sure,” Ethan said easily, pushing Benji’s earpiece back into position for him. 

Five minutes of furious button-mashing and several hissed cries of victory later, Benji’s name was at the top of the round’s leaderboard. “Thank you, thank you – be back in a bit, gents!” he crowed, pulling his headphones down around his neck as he craned to look at Ethan. “What’s going on?”

“You sure no one can find our location with that?” 

Benji scoffed. “You think I don’t scramble my IP address a dozen times before stepping foot in a public server? Some of these people get _competitive_ , Ethan.” 

“Glad you can defend international security and blow zombies up at the same time,” Ethan replied fondly, “but I can’t help but notice that your water’s been empty for the last hour.”

Benji glanced over at his glass of water which was, indeed, empty. Drops of water pooled at the bottom – there had been a couple inches of liquid left, but Ethan had dumped them out into the kitchen sink while his friend was otherwise occupied. “Huh.”

“Staying hydrated is an important part of being a good field agent, Benji. Go get some water.”

“You’re one to talk,” Benji retorted, but he started to get up, sliding his chair back. Didn’t make it far though, as the chair bumped up against Ethan’s legs a few inches into the maneuver. “Uh, Ethan?”

“Hm?” 

“I know you’re basically a ghost, but that doesn’t mean my chair can pass straight through your body.”

“Right, right.” Ethan couldn’t stop himself from grinning stupidly; he was just lucky that Benji couldn’t see his face. “Just a couple more things. You have to sit up straighter, Benji, like this.” 

Benji’s chair had slats on the back, and it was far too easy to reach between them and prod at the jutting angle of his spine – and when said spine straightened abruptly with a gasp, it was even easier to hook his hand under the hem of Benji’s shirt and attack the rest of his back.

Benji reacted violently. “Oh shi - dahahammit – this is your revehenge, isn’t it, you utter-”

“Yep!” Ethan said brightly. “And also a lesson in ergonomics. You need to bring your elbows in, too – parallel to the keyboard and each other, right?” Slipping his free hand under Benji’s arm made following his instructions compulsory, both of Benji’s elbows snapping tightly against his sides as he burst into a fresh round of laughter interspersed with cursing. “And you’re supposed to be looking straight ahead at your screen, not down at it-”

Ethan hesitated slightly before going for Benji’s neck, mindful of bruises still in their middle stages of healing. He settled for a light touch, fingers worming between the band of Benji’s headphones and the still-sensitive skin. It didn’t seem to matter much to Benji, who at this point was nearly falling off his chair as he begged for mercy. Ethan settled for one last tickle under his chin before withdrawing his hands and crouching beside the chair, propping Benji back up on his seat. 

Benji, gasping for air, reached immediately for his neck as if to reassure himself that there was nothing blocking his breathing. Ethan gently intercepted his hand before he could. “No harm done, right?” He grinned. “Your neck’s just as sensitive as ever.”

Benji glared at him and opened his mouth, then closed it and slumped back into his chair. “I hate you,” he complained to the ceiling. “You’re so nice and sappy that I can’t be properly mad at you even when you’ve almost made me piss myself.”

“Sorry,” Ethan chuckled.

“No, you’re not.”

“I’m not,” he conceded. “But now you can relax and watch me get Ilsa and Luther.”

Benji snorted. “Superspy Ethan Hunt, hellbent on revenge. I told them this would only end in disaster.”

\---

The next day, Ethan was sitting next to Ilsa as the team continued their ten-day streak of playing poker. It was also a seven-day streak of losing poker to Ilsa, and she scooped up the pile of spoons from the middle of their table with a smug smile – they’d stopped playing for chocolate bars yesterday, when Ilsa won the entire stash and only agreed to share with her teammates after a solid hour of complaining.

“I think we’ve had enough,” Ethan said ruefully. Benji and Luther voiced their firm agreement.

Ilsa’s smile widened. “Are you sure?”

“Yep,” Ethan said, standing up suddenly and approaching her chair. She went to stand as well, but she wasn’t fast enough to avoid Ethan bodily scooping her into a bridal carry. Her cutlery drawer’s worth of winnings clattered to the floor.

She froze for a moment, then punched him lightly in the arm. “You’re a sore loser, you brute. What are you going to do to me?” 

He felt her tense in his arms, wary despite herself, and quickly juggled one of his hands free to squeeze her side, a reassurance that the situation was completely playful. “Nothing you haven’t done to me already.”

She jerked away from the sensation, a helpless grin already curling in the corners of her mouth. “No!”

“I’m afraid I promised Benji that I would be equally cruel in my revenge on all of you,” he grinned back. “If you’ll excuse us, gentlemen?”

Luther raised an eyebrow. Benji offered Ilsa a solemn salute. “Good luck, mate.”

Ilsa’s eyes widened, but Ethan was already turning them around, headed into the adjoining room. Said room contained several chairs and a sofa, the latter of which he deposited his burden gently onto. Ilsa scrambled into a sitting position, knees protecting her chest, her eyes never leaving him. “Ethan…”

He sat down next to her, a little hurt at her evident surprise as he sank to her level. “It doesn’t hurt, you know.”

“I know,” she said, her posture loosening. “Just taken by surprise.”

“Okay.” He put one gentle hand on her knee. “We can take a rain check.”

Ilsa smiled. “That would hardly be fair to Benji. And he’s already lost so much today.”

“His fault, for betting so high.” Ethan pushed lightly at her knees; her feet slid off the sofa cushion and to the floor. “You tell me as soon as you get uncomfortable, understand?”

“Do you say that to all your tickling victims?” she joked, and oh, he wanted to see more of that smile.

“Only the ones I don’t know well enough to recognize their limits myself,” he replied, as seriously as he could. “You haven’t had a good handler or mandatory therapy in years. We’ll work on that, once IMF is ready for us, but for now? Help me make you feel safe.”

Ilsa looked a little as if she were about to cry, and that was the last thing he wanted. Still he waited patiently, thumb rubbing gentle circles into her kneecap, until she met his eyes again and smiled softly. “Do your worst, Ethan.”

“As you wish, Ms. Faust.” He drew her closer, passing one hand under her arm and then up around the back of her neck. It was a loose half-nelson, a hold he knew at least three ways of escaping, but it left her side exposed and she was already starting to laugh as he brought his free hand around her waist and started to scratch lightly at her ribcage.

She dissolved into giggles, turning from side to side to escape his fingers, but the loose hold worked well enough to keep her in his arms. A little too well, he thought, feeling her try to twist away from him and failing as she was laughing too much to do it properly. Her shoulders tensed against his chest, her hands coming up to grab at his. “Too much?” he asked, already untangling himself, but she shook her head.

“Noho, no, just – somewhere different?”

He thought for a moment. “Okay,” he replied, and bent down, scooping her ankles up in one hand and laying them across his lap. “Please don’t choke me with your legs.”

She grinned, then grinned wider, cursing softly as he stroked a finger down her sole. “Shit, that tickles!”

“I had no idea,” he said dryly. “I’ll remember that next time you demand that I take your shoes off for you.”

“Thahat was one time,” she protested weakly, her voice lost in a fresh wave of laughter as he increased his pace. At some point she’d moved to cling to his arm, laughing madly into his shoulder, and he wondered if this was why Julia had always enjoyed ambushing him – a confident, dangerous spy reduced to a very giggly limpet was really a sight to see. 

He stopped when he felt his shirtsleeve growing wet with Ilsa’s tears of laughter, laughing a little himself as she sat up and rubbed furiously at her face. “My cheeks are sore from smiling so much,” she complained. 

“Been a while, huh.” 

Still half in his lap, she stilled for a moment. “Since I’ve laughed like that? Years and years.”

“We’ll work on that too.”

\---

“You know you’re not taking me without a fight.”

Luther was sitting in a chair when Ethan snuck around the doorframe of his bedroom, arms crossed. He might as well have been smoking a Cuban cigar – it would only have added to his imposing look, one perfected across more than a decade of espionage.

Ethan, however, was unfazed. He propped one shoulder against the doorway. “Get up and face me, then. My ribs aren’t done healing yet, should be a fair fight.”

Luther shook his head and rose to his full height, almost a head taller than Ethan. “Don’t keep me waiting then, baby.”

Ethan laughed and charged forward, tackling his oldest friend onto the bed behind them. He could have had Luther pinned in seconds flat, but it wouldn’t have been nearly as fun that way – instead, he grappled with Luther until he was straddling the other man. 

Luther growled at him, his hands darting for Ethan’s stomach. They struggled over that too, Ethan snickering freely as he tried to push Luther’s hands away from him. He succeeded eventually, pinning Luther’s upper arm down with one of his feet, and launched an attack on his hips; eight years and two near-miss stab wounds ago, he’d learned that it was a particularly sensitive spot.

Luther succumbed to a hearty burst of laughter, but his hands weren’t fully restrained, and he managed to reach up and squeeze at that devilishly ticklish spot just above Ethan’s knee. He tipped to one side, flailing wildly as he tried to get away, and only realized how close they were to the edge of the bed after he’d toppled cleanly off it. 

He popped back up to find Luther flat on his back, absolutely _cackling_ with laughter at Ethan’s expense. Even his most foreboding look wouldn’t shut the man up, and Ethan found himself laughing along as well. 

He perched on the edge of the bed, ruefully rubbing the elbow he’d smacked against the floor. “Well, if I had to lose a fight, I’m glad it was this one.”

Luther wiped at his eyes. “That was the best thing I’ve ever seen,” he wheezed. “I owe Julia a drink. A lot of drinks. I’m going to airdrop a crate of alcohol at her next base camp.”

“She deserves it,” Ethan agreed. “She looked at me for ten seconds and knew exactly what I needed.”

Luther sat up and promptly flicked him in the forehead. “I know that tone of voice. And you know I’m not fond of it. What are you thinking about?”

Ethan sighed. “I should have said something more to her before she left. Thanked her more, gotten to know her husband. She’s still helping me, after all this time and everything I’ve done to her, and I just-”

“You saved her life, Ethan. And a lot of others. And as glad as I am that you’re on good terms, it doesn’t mean that you have to sit down and dredge up the past.” He paused. “But you know, if Benji can play PUBG from an IMF safehouse, he can definitely send an encrypted email. If you had someone you wanted to send an encrypted email to.”

“Oh, I think I know just the person.”

\---

Julia liked to start each morning by checking her email, when she could. Notes from friends, news articles, papers on patient care, spam… it was nice to remember that there was an entire world out there living their lives, and that she was helping people do the same.

There was something unusual about this email, though. It seemed as though she’d sent it to herself – and the subject read only ‘mission accomplished.’ 

Well, the email had survived some of the most robust virus scans known to man, courtesy of Ethan’s friend Benji. Surely it wouldn’t hurt to open it.

The email held two attachments. One appeared to be security camera footage of a bedroom, a lone man lounging on the bed, too small to make out on the thumbnail. The other was a word document, simply labeled ‘hi.’

She couldn’t help but laugh.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, and if you have any thoughts/criticism/other things you'd like to see me write, please leave a comment/kudos below!


End file.
